Elder Snowden ‘engineers’ deal with attorney Bruce Fein for his son’s return to US

More revelations emerge surrounding the Snowden Saga, as intelligence operative Edward Snowden is still in transit within Russia. Edward Snowden’s father, Lonnie Snowden, has subsequently retained attorney Bruce Fein from The Lichfield Group to aid in Ed’s return to U.S. soil. An interesting move, but what does this mean?

The Lichfield Group is a law firm that holds many global partnerships in addition to its political and media consulting. On its own website it alludes to directing or managing global concerns, including assisting foreign governments to influence the United States Congress:

“The Lichfield Group features unrivalled government, media, and business experience. Exemplary is the Group’s high level connections with the Department of Justice, the Department of State, and the Central Intelligence Agency. The Group’s unsurpassed combination of legal, business, media, political, and government savvy enables it to handle crisis management, tactical, or strategic positioning with unexcelled deftness.”

“Whether a client is a giant corporation handcuffed by ill-conceived United States government policies or a foreign government anxious to influence the decisions of Congress, the President, agencies, the judiciary, or State governments, The Lichfield Group is armed with the skills and contacts indispensable for success.“

Fein is a scholar for the American Enterprise Institute, which is closely connected to AIPAC, a main lobby for Israeli interests. Fein’s business associations largely consist of foreign governments and large oil conglomerates, all of which seem to be strange bed fellows for a “constitutional lawyer” of the United States.

In recent years, Fein has had his ethics called to question over a money laundering scandal involving the Turkish Coalition Of America (TCA) and Republican Representative Jean Schmidt from Ohio. This prompted a House Ethics Committee hearing in August of 2011. Although Fein was representing Schmidt, he had been in collaboration with the TCA and the Turkish lobby for sometime. Its not hard to think there may have been a conflict of interest.

Sibel Edmonds, a well-known FBI whistleblower had this to say about Fein’s character:

“I did not have to invent Bruce Fein’s Foreign Lobbyist status. It is in Mr. Fein’s resume and his past and present practices, showcased by him right here. Mr. Fein’s intimate associations with the CIA, the State Department and the White House are not based on any allegations; it is in his resume as written by him. Mr. Fein’s position and membership in the Neocon Nest AEI is a fact that is highlighted and used by him when needed. The ruling on Mr. Fein’s foreign lobby money funneling scheme is not some rumor; it is in an official congressional report.“

Edmond’s added this in another Boiling Frogs Post in 2011:

“With Bruce Fein you have exactly the opposite stand. He has been a crusty foreign lobbyist making millions of dollars peddling his foreign bosses’ interests and influence in Congress and government agencies. For Fein it has never mattered who the foreign client or what their agenda. He does not care whether his foreign clients are criminals or terrorists or dictators. As long as they pay him handsomely he’ll sell their agenda and interest no matter what they may be.”

In 2012 Fein was named Chief Legal Advisor to Ron Paul by campaign manager Jesse Benton. Benton was promptly accused by critics after the 2012 elections, of having sabotaged Ron Paul’s Presidential bid from within, partly due to bringing Fein into the fold. As Paul’s popularity soared, those around him seemingly took advantage to further their own political gain, thus thwarting the efforts of the seminal figure within the libertarian movement.

Once again, we find the pro-Israel lawyer Bruce Fein curiously at the center of a pivotal political event in America. 21st Century Wire has already revealed the Israeli foreign lobby’s well-financed multi-million dollar TV ad effort to derail the Paul campaign during the GOP primaries last year, a connection too large to ignore:

“Ron Paul is the only GOP candidate who is not overtly ‘pro-Israel’ in the popular neoconservative sense. On January 13, in the run-up to the pivotal South Carolina GOP primary, the Emergency Committee for Israel, run by neoconservative thinker William Kristol, released an ad in which its Director Gary Bauer makes a plea to voters – not endorsing any candidate, rather, telling conservatives that they must reject Congressman Ron Paul as their GOP candidate, deriding his foreign policy views with respect to America’s ‘special relationship’ with Israel, and fighting the War on Terror – concluding that, “We can do better than Ron Paul”. See their advert here:

Follow Fein, and discover the design…

Amazingly, it was Fein who authored the very first articles to impeach U.S. President Barack Obama, later introduced by Representative Walter Jones of North Carolina. Without a doubt, there are many that would genuinely support this piece of legislation but what one should ask here, what were Fein’s motives, and how does fit in with the foreign interests he represents?

Shortly after the impeachment papers were introduced, they quickly faded away from the political stratosphere until just recently.

Is Fein really the constitutional lawyer his credentials claim him to be?

If Fein is acting on behalf of Israeli or Neoconservative interests, what would be the motive to control the NSA narrative? How does it effect, or benefit Israel politically in terms of its hold over US foreign policy and US public opinion? Most importantly, could the Snowden Affair in fact have been engineered to sway the balance of power in Washington DC?

It remains to be seen if Lonnie Snowden is aware of Fein’s past connections to foreign entities and the intelligence community. However, readers should pay close attention to this important development while in the search for truth within the Snowden, NSA story.

And lastly, there is the financial issue of Wikileaks and their handling of Snowden. The USA TODAY article hints at what many have suspected:

“Attorney Bruce Fein, who represents Lonnie Snowden, said Friday that Snowden’s father is worried that the legal counsel and travel expenses provided by WikiLeaks are part the plan to “keep (Edward Snowden) from doing the right thing” by returning to the USA to confront the espionage charges filed against him.

“They are using him to raise money,“ Fein said in an interview with USA TODAY.

Assange and WikiLeaks representatives have acknowledged that they are financing Snowden’s efforts to seek asylum and his international travel to avoid arrest by the U.S. government…”

The father of Edward Snowden, the former defense contractor accused of disclosing details about secret U.S. surveillance programs, is concerned that his son’s recent association with the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks is being used by its founder Julian Assange to raise the organization’s public profile for fundraising purposes.

Attorney Bruce Fein, who represents Lonnie Snowden, said Friday that Snowden’s father is worried that the legal counsel and travel expenses provided by WikiLeaksare part the plan to “keep (Edward Snowden) from doing the right thing” by returning to the USA to confront the espionage charges filed against him.

“They are using him to raise money,” Fein said in an interview with USA TODAY.

Assange and WikiLeaks representatives have acknowledged that they are financing Snowden’s efforts to seek asylum and his international travel to avoid arrest by the U.S. government.

The 30-year-old fugitive may still be in a Moscow airport transit area after fleeing Hong Kong on Sunday as U.S. authorities sought his extradition. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said he will not extradite Snowden to the USA but also has not allowed Snowden to leave the airport transit area. Ecuador is considering a request from Snowden for political asylum.

In an unusual attempt to broker an agreement for Snowden’s return, Fein sent a letter Thursday to Attorney General Eric Holder, stating that Snowden’s father was reasonably confident he could arrange his son’s return in exchange for “ironclad assurances his constitutional rights would be honored and he were provided a fair opportunity to explain his motivations and actions to an impartial judge and jury.”

The content of the letter was first reported by NBC News.

In the letter, Fein asked that the government not detain Snowden before trial; that Snowden not be subject to a gag order, prohibiting him from speaking about the case; and that Snowden be tried in a venue of his choosing.

“With these written representations and guarantee, Mr. Snowden is reasonably confident that his son could be persuaded to surrender voluntarily to the jurisdiction of the United States to face trial,” the letter states.

Justice Department spokeswoman Nanda Chitre said Friday that she was not aware the letter had been received. She declined further comment.

Lonnie Snowden sketched out the offer in an interview with NBC News investigative reporter Michael Isikoff that aired on the Today program Friday morning.

Snowden said he had not spoken with his son since Edward left the country last month and revealed classified information about the National Security Agency’s surveillance and data-collection network.

“I love him. I would like to have the opportunity to communicate with him,” he told NBC.

The elder Snowden said he doesn’t feel that his son has, at this point, committed treason.

“He has in fact broken U.S. law, in a sense that he has released classified information,” he told NBC News. “And if folks want to classify him as a traitor, in fact he has betrayed his government. But I don’t believe that he’s betrayed the people of the United States.”